While
most of the media attention about the various Iraq-war funding bills
has been focused on the battle between the Democrat-led Congress and
President Bush on a time-table for troop withdrawal, more attention
needs to be given to the 'pork' that has been added to the Democrat-sponsored
bills, 'pork' the White
House calls, "excessive and extraneous non-emergency spending."

-Billions
of dollars in domestic spending for farm drought relief, medical
coverage for poor children and hurricane recovery
-Projects
on the reconstruction of New Orleans levees and peanut storehouses
in Georgia
-$25 million for spinach growers hit by last year's E. coli scare
-$500 million for wildfire prevention for the West Coast
-$120 million for shrimp and Atlantic menhaden fishermen
-$15 million to prevent salt water 'intrusion' on Louisiana rice
fields

-$3
million for funding a sugar cane Hawaiian co-op
-$24 million for funding for sugar beets
-$2 million to the University of Vermont Education Excellence Program
-$25 million for the Safe and Drug Free Schools program
-$48 million for disaster reconstruction for NASA
-$13 million for mine safety research
-$25 million for asbestos abatement and tunnel repair at the Capitol
Power Plant
-$640 million for LIHEAP
-$13.2 million for avian flu research and monitoring
-$3.5 million related to guided tours of the U.S. Capitol
-$22.8 million for geothermal research and development
-$12 million for forest service money (requested by the president
in the non-emergency FY2008 budget)

You
don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that this amounts to the
Democrats trying to buy votes. Plain and simple. Even trying to buy
the President's vote with the last one listed. But it's not working.

Here's
an example that the Washington
Post points out: "For more than a year, Rep. Charles Boustany
Jr. (R) has tried unsuccessfully to secure federal funds to prevent
salt water from intruding on rice fields in his lowland Louisiana
district. So it came as a surprise last week when Boustany found $15
million in the House's huge war spending bill for his rice farmers.
He hadn't even asked that the bill include it."

Fortunately
Boustany is not buying it. He said, "It gives me no satisfaction to
vote against measures that I have been working for since even before
[Hurricane] Katrina, but I cannot in good conscience vote for a bill
that does this to our troops," Boustany said yesterday, decrying what
he called the "cheap politics" of using disaster aid to win votes
on a measure this controversial."

Isn't
it interesting that Nancy Pelosi said in response to the President's
refusal to sign the last version of the bill, "It is clear that the
difference between the Democrats and the president is the issue of
accountability. He will not accept any accountability or responsibility
for what is happening (in Iraq)."

Ooops.

Is
filling the bill with pork to get votes being responsible...and accountable?

John
Bolten, former Ambassador to the UN, said the Democrats have made
it impossible for the president to sign the bill because of insisting
on a timetable for troop withdrawal. "Whether waiveable or not, timelines
send exactly the wrong signal to our adversaries, to our allies and,
most importantly, to the troops in the field."

Again,
the Washington
Post reported, "Republicans say the Democrats' failure to pass
a "clean'' funding bill without any conditions has hurt military operations
around the world by requiring Pentagon planners to juggle money among
accounts. Democrats say there is enough money to fund Iraq operations
into July -- more than enough time for the deadlock to be resolved."

Sharon is the President of The Center for Changing
Worldviews, and hosts Changing Worldviews TALK Radio which is heard on
KDIA AM1640 San Francisco; WITA AM1490 Knoxville,TN, nationally on Rightalk.com
and internationally on Oneplace.com. Her column appears on several online
news sites including American Daily.com, CaliforniaRepublic.org, ChronWatch.com,
Ediblog.com, MichNews.com, Newsbull.com, NewsWithviews.com, RaidersNewsUpdate.com
RenewAmerica.us and others. For further information on her lineup of guests
and topics visit:

You
don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that this amounts to the Democrats
trying to buy votes. Plain and simple. Even trying to buy the President's
vote with the last one listed. But it's not working.